How Many Calories Does Bachata Burn?

How Many Calories Does Bachata Burn?

The short answer: about 310 to 460 calories per hour for a 150 lb person, depending on intensity, body weight, and the style of bachata you're dancing.

Heavier individuals burn more calories. A 180 lb person will burn roughly 40% more than a 130 lb person doing the same dance.

Bachata vs Other Dances, Calorie Comparison

Social bachata burns about the same as brisk walking and less than a moderate cycling session, but it's way more fun. And unlike gym workouts, a 3-hour social dance night flies by because you're having a great time.

What Muscles Does Bachata Work?

• Core, body waves, isolations
• Legs & glutes, the basic step, lateral movement, turns
• Hips, the signature hip pop on beats 4 and 8
• Arms & shoulders, lead/follow connection, styling
• Back, posture, dips, and sensual body rolls

Health Benefits Beyond Calories

• Cardiovascular health, sustained moderate exercise
• Coordination & balance, constant partner synchronization
• Flexibility, body waves, dips, and stretching movements
• Mental health, social connection and music
• Stress relief, physical expression and social connection
• Memory, learning combinations and responding to leads may help mental functioning

How Are Bachata Calories Calculated?

Bachata has no entry of its own in the Compendium of Physical Activities, a research list of MET values. The figures on this page are estimates built from its closest dance codes.

A MET compares an activity's energy cost with sitting quietly, and one MET is defined as 1 kcal per kilogram of body weight per hour. So calories per hour equal the MET value times your weight in kilograms. For a 150 lb (68 kg) dancer:

• Ethnic or cultural dancing, a code whose examples include salsa and merengue (03025, 4.5 METs): about 310 calories an hour.
• Salsa dancing with a partner (03090, 4.8 METs): about 330 calories an hour.
• Ballet, modern or jazz performance, vigorous effort (03012, 6.8 METs): about 460 calories an hour, the closest code for performance-level dancing.

Classes burn less because of the pauses. In a 2016 study of physically inactive women, a one-hour partnered salsa class burned about 210 kcal, with about 33 minutes at moderate-to-vigorous intensity. A one-hour Zumba class burned about 411 kcal.

What Changes How Many Calories You Burn?

• Body weight. The formula multiplies by weight, so a 180 lb dancer burns about 38% more than a 130 lb dancer at the same effort. Harvard Health's table shows the same pattern: 30 minutes of disco, ballroom or square dancing burns about 165 calories at 125 lb, 198 at 155 lb and 231 at 185 lb.
• Intensity. The CDC counts 3 to 5.9 METs as moderate and 6 or more as vigorous, and lists vigorous dancing as vigorous activity. Social dancing sits in the moderate band.
• Your own body. The Compendium's authors say it was not developed to give the precise energy cost of an activity for an individual. Resting metabolism varies with age, sex, height, weight and lean mass, so treat every figure here as an estimate.